Starting with a brief introduction of what Chinese thinkers thought in 1870s-1920s about so-called "modern history" and western style modernization, the lecture will use Nong Country, a non-western plan for nation-building proposed by Zhang Shizhao in 1920s, as a key point to give an overview of what the Chinese intellectuals/politicians/reformers imagined, outlined and practiced in 1910s-1940s for a new China that would be very different from what modern history has forced China to be. 

Texts to Read:

ZHANG Shi Zhao, ‘An Elaborative Argumentation of a “Nong Country” (Xin Wen Newspaper, 1st & 2nd, Nov. 1923)
Tsui SIT and Tak Hong WONG, ‘Rural China: From Modernization to Reconstruction’, Asian Studies, 49:1 (2013), 43-68.

WANG Xiaoming is Professor of Cultural Studies at Shanghai University. (2001- ) and Distinguished Adjunct Professor of Humanities at Lingnan University (2013-2016). He focuses currently on China's urban cultural conditions as well as Chinese modern thought.